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PARIS (Thomson Financial) - Concrete pouring at the site of the future EPR nuclear reactor in Flamanville was stopped May 21 after an inspection found "anomalies", France's nuclear safety authority said. "The anomalies pose no safety problem, but they demonstrate an unacceptable lack of rigour at the construction site," said Thomas Houdre, head of the authority's Caen office, said at a press conference.

The authority, the ASN, requested that EDF stop new concrete work until internal controls are improved. greg.keller@thomsonreuters.com gk1/ajb

6 comments:

I just wonder if there is in fact enough qualified personnel who can work on power plant construction in the West. Sounds like there is just too few people with good enough level of skills, or they are approaching pension age.

In my country, Canada, the older baby boomers filled up all the trades jobs, at the same time an anti-development attitude crept into the populace and leaders in the mid-1980's.

So there was a surplus of skilled tradespeople and few new ones were trained. The generation X people had to think of ways to make money besides the traditional corporate or government job for life, or trades.

Now things have changed. There is a pro-development attitude, and lots of work to be done.. But the tradesmen are now retiring and the companies are getting desperate. There is pages of jobs advertisements in the papers.. But I notice the large companies are not yet willing to raise wages. The smaller companies are paying whatever it takes to get skilled people, and then just adding that to the cost of their jobs.

A problem for the big corporations is if they raise the wages for a 'lower' job group to what the market needs, they'd have to change the pay structure across their organization.. which they aren't willing to do, so the job goes empty or they get someone not very good.

Small companies can change so quickly that they are achieving success, you see it in the shiny decked out new trucks their workers have. I think some of the older big companies may either have to contract out or get out of the way.

It will be interesting to see how things go in Asia. Korea has a strong nuclear infrastructure and China is getting tehcnology transfer from both AREVA and Westinghouse. We may be surprised how fast these countries catch up and contribute to nuclear resurgence in the west.

Yes, especially with such giants like China and India - developing quickly, growing energy demands, not ro much radiophobia and citizen "environmentalist" movements - nothing stops them except from technology availiablity. But that is just a matter of time.

This blog is devoted to major events going on in the world of nuclear technology and run by a journalist and researcher from Belarus studying in Sweden, willing to draw public attention to atomic technology development, security and consequences of its usage. Is the "atom" really so peaceful as we are told on TV?

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